For many years, standardized tests have been administered to examinees for various reasons, such as for educational testing or for evaluating particular skills. For example, academic skills tests (e.g., SATs, GREs, LSATs, GMATs, etc.) are typically administered to a large number of students. Results of these tests are used by colleges, universities and other educational institutions as a factor in determining whether an examinee should be admitted to study at that educational institution. Other standardized testing is carried out to determine whether or not an individual has attained a specified level of knowledge or mastery of a given subject.
Traditionally, standardized tests have been paper-based, whereby examinees are gathered in a room and given paper test materials, usually comprising a question booklet and an answer sheet that is computer-readable by optical or magnetic means. With the growth of the computer industry and the reduction in price of computing equipment, fields in which information has traditionally been distributed on paper have begun to convert to electronic information distribution means. The field of standardized testing is no exception. A modestly-priced computer system can be used in place of a paper test booklet to administer test questions to a user. The use of computer systems to deliver test questions to users is generically described as “computer based testing” (CBT). One system for computer-based testing is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,827,070 (Kershaw, et al.), which is commonly assigned to the assignee hereof and which is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety.
While systems for computer-based testing have been available, they have generally relied on outdated technologies, such as physical delivery of test questions and related software. While physical delivery of data and software on data storage media (e.g., on optical disk or magnetic tape) is reliable and secure, it is slow and cumbersome because it has a built in lag time (i.e., the time it takes to deliver the medium), and it requires a person to physically handle the delivery medium (i.e., to install the disk or mount the tape). While installation of initial testing materials on physical media may be acceptable, using physical media to provide recurring updates to the materials may, in some cases, be unacceptably cumbersome. With advances in networking, as exemplified by the growth in the capacity and usage of the Internet, network communication is quickly supplanting physical delivery in many contexts, and modem expectations demand no less than the speed that network communications can provide, while still retaining the security and reliability of physical delivery. In the testing context, the need to preserve security and reliability when introducing network distribution cannot be overemphasized.